


all the roads that lead us there were winding

by pendules



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Coda, Episode: s07e17 The Born-Again Identity, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-30
Updated: 2012-03-30
Packaged: 2017-11-02 18:27:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/372010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pendules/pseuds/pendules
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-7x17. Dean goes back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	all the roads that lead us there were winding

He doesn't know how many miles he drives. He supposes when you keep driving in opposite directions, they all cancel each other out. Maybe he's never moved an inch in his life.

He feels like he's always driving towards something that eludes him. Whether it's his father's love or his brother's trust or his own happiness. These days, he feels like all he's been doing is chasing ghosts. And not the literal kind.

Sam is so, so quiet for hours after they leave Cas. Dean keeps expecting him to say, "We should go back." He thinks maybe he'd just turn the car around right then if he did. Maybe it won't matter at all, but maybe that's what they have to do.

Sam doesn't say anything though, and Dean just keeps driving, eyes fixed on the road.

*

Sam falls asleep just before they cross the stateline. Dean finally glances across at him. He thinks about pulling over, maybe catching a few hours himself, maybe just keeping an eye on him, making sure everything's really okay, trying to focus on just that and not everything else. Everything else will come later, in the morning, in a week or two. But for now, Sammy's okay, and that's enough. Sometimes, that's all he needs to know.

He slows down, tries to not make any sharp turns, to take the bumps in the road as gently as possible. He has this fuzzy memory of rocking Sam to sleep, just a little while before the fire, humming some weird four-year-old song to him, from a cartoon or cereal commercial or something. He's not sure if it's real or fabricated, but he's never told anyone about it. He just wants to keep that one thing for himself. This doesn't feel unlike that at all.

*

He wakes up as they drive into town, the sun peeking out from behind the clouds. 

"How are you feeling?" Dean asks, for the first time. 

"I'm - I'm okay." It's like he's surprised by that but he's trying unsuccessfully to hide it. He sounds like he's a lot better than he wants Dean to know. Like he's almost sorry for it.

Dean will take that though. He'll take it. He doesn't have much left otherwise. Not anymore. Not much hope, not for anything or anyone.

*

"Are you sure you're up for the case?" Dean asks when they're done with breakfast.

"Are you?" Sam asks, and Dean's pretty sure he's not supposed to be the one with the worried look right now. Maybe he got so used to having these immediate, urgent problems that he forgot about the lull between them when there were no major distractions and he had to deal with his own shit.

"I'm - I'm..."

"You're fine? You're not fine. You're so far away from fine, you don't know what it looks like anymore. Nothing's changed, Dean."

"God, Sam, I think I'm starting to miss when you were a headcase."

"No, you're not getting away from this conversation. I'm okay now. I think. But Cas is stuck in the loony bin because of us. And Bobby's...gone. And I don't think I can make any of that better for you. But you have to talk to me, man." He really means it, the poor son of a bitch. He really just wants to be able to do something, anything, for him. But this - this isn't a simple problem. Even a head wall breaking and letting hell and the devil in is simpler than this.

"Sam... you don't. You don't want any part of this. Trust me," he says, voice gruff, as firm as he can make it.

"We shouldn't have left him," Sam says finally, so quiet. There's so much guilt in his voice that should never be there, that Dean knows he put there.

"No," Dean says, smiling kind of painfully. "But that's what we do. We just ruin everything and everyone and then leave them all behind."

Sometimes he thinks about the trail of destruction they seem to always leave in their wake. Maybe people should count themselves lucky when the Winchesters are driving in the opposite direction.

*

Sam's slept like a baby for three nights straight. Dean doesn't get more than two or three hours. Usually, he's just watching Sam. The times he does nod off, he has these strange dreams that seem to be a mixture of heaven and hell. He sees Cas in a beautiful meadow, bathed in pure white light, standing over hundreds of dead angels; he sees Sam trapped at the bottom of Lucifer's cage, hell fire licking at the sides of his face, staring up at him, screaming for him. He sees what he imagines is Cas's mind now: flames and grace and the devil's repulsive sneer, and Dean, Dean, Dean. Dean looking at him tenderly, eyes warm and bright. Dean's eyes strangely lifeless and empty. Dean's eyes black, soul deformed, turned into some evil, twisted version of himself. It's strange, how your own nightmares get replaced by others'.

He'll wake up sometimes with Cas's name on his lips.

*

Sam's chasing down a lead, and he's doing "research." He's so tired. So tired he can't think in full thoughts. Just fragments, and they're abrupt and confused and _Sam_ and _Cas_ and … He falls asleep reaching for the whiskey bottle. 

It's intensely vivid this time.

He's locked up, restrained, strapped to a bed in a padded room. It's like a movie; it's like every bad dream he's ever had playing out before him. Every person he's lost, every person he couldn't save. And Lucifer's pacing up and down in front of him, commenting on every one of them. "Trip down memory lane," he calls it. The last one... it's Cas, the light gone out from his eyes, and his wings are charred, but they're so beautiful still, and he can almost remember hell, and Cas fighting his way out of the pit, one hand securely around Dean's arm, never, ever letting him go.

He wakes up, startled, and he's suddenly completely alert.

He knows what he has to do.

He writes a quick note to Sam, grabs his jacket and keys, drives out of town faster than he ever has.

*

(Sam will read the note, just three words, but written with steady hands, a steady mind: _I'm going back._

He'll know what it means. He'll know that this is how Dean has to begin working it all out.)

*

"Emmanuel. We just checked him in a couple days ago," he's saying to the receptionist, feeling kind of jittery all of a sudden, hands clammy, mouth dry.

He doesn't even know what to expect. He has a feeling this is actually a whole other ballpark from what he saw with Sam.

*

He's heavily sedated, not because he needs to sleep, but because apparently he has a tendency to wreck the entire room. Even when he's strapped down. Dean stares in at him through the small window in the door, and he grimaces because Cas looks so small, so weak, so different from any state Dean's ever seen him in. Even when he was human or dying. This is a different kind of weakness altogether.

It's a while before he's up to having visitors. Dean's taken to having naps in the car, and then turning up to check on Cas. (The receptionist most definitely hates him by now.)

He knows he should probably check in to a motel, but he's still not sure he isn't going to have bolt soon, whether because of his own uncertainty or Sam.

*

He finally gets to see him in the visiting area. There are a few other patients around, tapping keys on the piano or playing cards or board games, with their visitors nervously looking at them like they're going to explode at any moment. 

He doesn't know what he's going to say.

"Dean?" His voice is shocked, and he can tell it's not just because he's surprised he came back.

When Dean looks up, his eyes are just as surprised. He's just standing there, staring at him, a nurse holding onto his arm.

"I thought you were dead," he says, as he sits down across from Dean, the nurse still hovering awkwardly behind him. Dean supposes he's a high-risk case. It figures.

"I saw you die, I mean," he continues, and just stops, like he's unsure he should be saying that. Like he's wondering if this, too, is real. If it's some kind of sick test. He looks like he just wants to reach out and see if Dean's really there, like he's fighting the urge.

"Physical contact may help to establish familiar sensations that indicate reality," the nurse says soothingly.

Cas can't ever have anything like Sam's hand wound, he knows. He can't feel the physical pain, can't have unhealed cuts. But this - this is different. This is Dean, and Lucifer's trying to break Cas by convincing him that Dean's not there for him anymore. (He kind of hates that it was almost true.)

Dean reaches out first. He takes Cas's hand in his gently, leaves them both resting on Cas's leg.

Cas just looks down, takes a deep breath, and squeezes Dean's hand slightly, almost experimentally. 

Dean brushes his thumb over Cas's knuckles, and can feel him relax, can almost feel his energy warm up and wash over him.

Maybe he's strong enough to beat this, Dean thinks. Maybe he just needed a reason to believe.

*

"How is he?" Sam asks, like he's dreading the answer.

"He's... yeah, in pretty bad shape. But I think, I think me being here is doing something. I don't know. Maybe."

"That's... that's good, Dean. It really is." And he sounds relieved, but not just for Cas. It's like he knows this is helping Dean. 

And the really fucked-up part? Dean thinks it is too.

*

Dean meets him in the garden just before sunset.

"Is it better out here or worse?" he asks, automatically overthinking everything he says.

"It's - it's more freeing. It's easier to stop thinking so much, to get out of my head, get away -"

"I - sometimes I dream about flying," Dean says, regretting the words as they fall out of his mouth.

"That's interesting," Cas says, and he looks slightly amused by it, forehead creasing familiarly, and Dean appreciates seeing that expression again.

"I mean, flying with you. Out of the pit." And Cas looks surprised instead now.

"I mean, I don't actually remember," he continues quickly. "So I must have made it up. But... but it must have been amazing."

"Yes," Cas says, quietly. "It was." He looks like he's remembering, something sad and incredible at the same time.

Dean wants to say to him, _You got me out of hell once. Now it's my turn._

He settles for holding his hand on the bench between them.

*

Dean visits every day, even the really bad ones when he can't see anyone. He just settles for pacing the hallways, trying to pick up scraps of conversations between the doctors and nurses.

After a few weeks, he seems to be improving. Or at least not getting worse for the time being.

Dean spends hours with him, just holding his hand, or talking about innocent subjects that won't overburden his already burdened mind, like the doctors said to. Dean tries teaching him poker for a while, and he definitely has the face for it. It's a good distraction, but he gets bored of it quickly.

Mostly, he just seems content to be in Dean's company, whether they're saying anything or not.

*

It's been about a month, and Cas apparently thinks he's been doing well enough to ask questions.

"So, do you know what the Leviathans are up to?"

"Cas, we shouldn't -" he says warningly.

"Dean, I'm not a child. And this - it's because of me." His head is bowed as he says it. He's still guilt-ridden about what he did. He's never asked for Dean's forgiveness though. Maybe he doesn't think he deserves it. 

He has it though. He does.

So Dean sighs and tells him about Dick Roman, and his plan which, granted, they really don't know that much about anyway.

Cas seems interested by all of it though.

Maybe he just wants to feel like he's needed again. Even if he can't help. Even if Dean doesn't think anyone can help them anymore.

*

He has a pretty bad relapse a couple days later. Dean's pretty sure this is Lucifer's retaliation for too many strolls in the garden and cozy, armchair conversations. He doesn't get to visit him at all, and he paces his motel room for hours at a time, trying not to smash any lamps or put his fist through the wall. He has short, tense phone calls with a very wary Sam who is smart enough to know when to hang up or when to just wait out the lulls in the conversation, when to say, "It'll be okay, I know it," or, "We knew he wouldn't just - We were prepared for this. We'll deal with it." 

He gets increasingly restless periods of sleep, and then wakes up to do the same thing all over again.

Finally, he really, really can't take it. 

He grabs his jacket and slams the door behind him, almost breaking it off its hinges.

*

For a mental hospital, it's pretty easy to break in. But then again, they probably are more concerned about people breaking _out_. 

He's actually had a key to Cas's room for a while, in case of an emergency, in case they needed to get him out fast, demons, Leviathans, who knows. If there's one thing Dean is, it's prepared. He wasn't really planning on any romantic midnight visits though. But he's been going out of his fucking mind, and he just needs to know. He needs to know if Cas is gone completely, if when he looks into his eyes, he won't see him looking back at him with that particular mix of curiosity and wonder that is all Cas. He needs to know if all hope is gone.

"Dean?" comes a strained voice from the far corner of the room when he slips in. And that's a good sign, right, even if Cas sounds completely wrecked.

"Cas? You okay?" He approaches carefully. 

He's curled up on the bed, looking so impossibly small, and Dean doesn't know if this is worse or better than all the terrible things he's been imagining.

"Hey," he says, gently, sitting down next to him, placing a hand on his side to stroke him.

He turns over gradually to look at Dean, sits up slowly.

His face is so pale, eyes blown wide open and haunted.

"I killed them," he says, and Dean feels cold all over. "I killed them all. He made me. He made me. I couldn't - I couldn't _stop_ -"

"No, no," Dean says, hushing him. "It's not real. Cas, it's not real. I promise." 

He reaches out to grab him by his shoulders, forcing him to understand.

There are tears dripping down his face now, and his head his bent, and he's rocking back and forth in Dean's arms.

"It felt so real. They - they were screaming. It was so loud... _so loud_..."

Dean lets go of his body, and reaches up to grasp his jaw instead. He kisses him, brief but deep, eyes closed, trying to focus all his feelings, the confusion and the hurt and the guilt and the gratitude, into that one action because Cas needs it so desperately.

"This? This is real," he whispers when he pulls away.

They lie on the narrow bunk, facing each other, toes and knees and elbows touching, hands intertwined between them. Cas stares and stares, and Dean stares right back until he falls asleep.

It's his best night of sleep in weeks.

*

When he wakes up, Cas smiles at him, so soft and content.

When he kisses him this time, there's only one thing he's feeling.

*

Sam's finally there, and Cas looks so happy to see him. Maybe even happier than he was to see Dean. Because Sam's alright, and Dean can tell that Cas finally knows he's forgiven him, that he's more than made up for it. That everything he's ever done for them made up for it.

It's kind of weird having him there with this new thing suddenly in between them now. It feels kind of like the beginning again, adjusting to this different part of their relationship. Dean's still getting used to it, but they're easier with each other now, more comfortable, sharing casual touches and not so casual ones, knowing looks that feel a lot less one-sided these days. 

Sam just looks at them oddly sometimes, like he's seeing something beyond their simple interactions, and he smiles a little to himself, like he can't help it, before shaking his head and looking away. Sam's always been a lot more discerning than he lets on, and Dean's not really trying to hide anything.

It is what it is. Every relationship he's ever had has been unfairly complicated, and this one is probably the worst. Trying to explain it, or explain it away, is too much effort than he's willing to spend right now.

There are more important things to focus on.

*

"You love him, don't you?" It's not really a question. Maybe he's just trying to understand, the way Dean wants to but probably never will.

He doesn't avoid it. He's too tired, now, to fight his brother's concern anymore. "I don't know. Maybe."

"It's why you came back, isn't it?"

"I don't know if I did then..." He stops abruptly, like he's afraid he's saying the wrong thing. He shakes his head slightly.

"I don't know why I came back," Dean finally admits. He feels really selfish suddenly, finally letting himself acknowledge the nagging thought that maybe he didn't come here for Cas but because of his own guilt.

"You came back because you wanted it to be different this time," Sam says. And he's right, Dean realises.

It's true. He had hope. He had faith because Cas always had faith in _him_. 

"Yeah, I really want it to," Dean breathes out.

His hope is rewarded so, so rarely. If this is the last bit he's ever allowed, he'll take it. _Just... please_ , he thinks. _Please._

*

"How are you feeling?" It's a question he hasn't asked in a long time. He isn't sure anymore what he expects when he does. 

Cas is just sitting on his bed, looking out at the sun rising through his tiny window. 

He turns back to him, looking so, so peaceful, looking almost like someone else. Cas has been so many different people in the time Dean's known him. But Dean's always known who the real one was. Maybe they've had that in common. They've always known how to reach beneath the surface and find each other's core.

Maybe Cas gets to change though. Maybe he gets to be happier than the Cas Dean knows ever will. 

It's the first time he thinks about it since he's seen him, about leaving and never looking back, like he probably should have the first time. He'll be better off, the voice in the back of his head says, and it's right. And Dean's never had to deal with the devil in there, but this is so much worse.

It almost comes out. He almost says it. He almost says, "This isn't right." He almost says, "When you get out, you should go back. Go back to Daphne, or back to heaven, or wherever. Just somewhere away from me." When Cas starts to argue, maybe he'll yell at him, tell him it wasn't real, he's not - he's not, _they're_ not. The hurt he'll see flash across his face will kill him for a moment, but he'll tell himself it's worth it.

Cas looks concerned, says, "Dean," like he's said it a few times before without him responding.

He finally reaches out, grips his forearm firmly. Dean breathes in, composes himself. He tries to avoid Cas's gaze, but he won't let him.

"Hey. Hey, where did you go?" His features are relaxed again, mouth in a soft smile, eyes a clear and light blue. He doesn't suspect a thing.

"Nowhere," Dean says, returning his smile. "Nowhere."


End file.
